One of my favorite Zappa songs, “Black Napkins,” performed on the Mike Douglas Show in 1976. Kinda reflects my mood these days, but I’ll snap out of it. Meanwhile, have a great weekend, and for those of you in the midwest, have fun with the cicadas.

Yep. The American Flag now flies over the U.S. Embassy in a country dedicated to the abolishment of the one form of government that is guaranteed to bring its denizens out of poverty, i.e., capitalism.

I pity those who think that capitalism is a bad thing, for they’ve been deceived and lied to, and the people who suffered under Castro’s brutal and oppressive regime are unable to speak.

Except for a very few, and I’ve met some of them. They’re not happy about this at all because they remember what happened to themselves and their families when the communists took over.

So where do we go from here?

¡MUSICA CUBANO!

The Cuban sound is a mixture of Spanish, African and European styles, an eclectic mix that blends well. Meanwhile, here’s another great Cuban:

Steven Stills & Manassas. Stills wanted to become one of The Monkees prior to his days with CSN&Y, but he was rejected for contract conflicts. It probably had something to do with being a Cuban, like this orchestra:

In case you didn’t click the link last time around, that’s Prague’s Talichova Komorní Filharmonie in 2012 performing a classic song by the late Cuban composer Frank Zappa.

I was talking to a younger co-worker today, and out of the blue he asked what my favorite band was. Good question with an easy answer.

My response was Frank Zappa, any lineup post-Mothers, beginning with “Apostrophe.” Jazz, rock, & pop, Zappa had all genres covered, and he did them all well (especially R&B DooWop). “Peaches En Regalia” is one of my favorite songs [00:54:00].

Zappa was one of the few popular musicians/composers that I would have liked to have met face-to-face, but since I’m not in the industry, and that Frank Zappa passed away years ago, it’s not going to happen.

Dweezil & Co. plays Frank. Jump to 0:2:45 for the start of awesome (and yes, according to FZ, Dweezil was named after his mother’s little toe).

Country pop annoys me for many reasons. It’s predictable, prepackaged, over engineered and mass-produced; the rhymes are stretched, and it has no soul. But Southern Rock kicks. Here’s The Allman Brothers ‘ “Whipping Post” from September 1970 as interpreted by Frank Zappa and band (here’s why) circa 1984.

Ike Willis‘s version of Zappa’s “Suicide Chump” with Sarah Zimmerman. Most of her stuff is acoustic, but she’s no slouch on electric slide guitar. The last line in the song is “All you can say as you run down the street is:” and Willis cuts it off. In Zappa’s version, it transmogrifies into “Jumbo Go Away.”

Let’s get back to the slide.

Johnny Winter‘s “Mean Town Blues” from 1970, and no, that’s not a cover – he wrote it. Awesome Texas boogie in the style of John Lee Hooker.